Hanne is a PhD student in Organizational Behavior at Harvard Business School. She is interested in understanding how people navigate the complexities of conversation. She is especially interested in how we think about and (mis)understand the minds of others in conversation and how we can optimize these interactions to get the most out of our relationships. Hanne received her B.A. Honors in Psychology from the University of British Columbia in Vancouver, Canada.
Hanne is a PhD student in Organizational Behavior at Harvard Business School. She is interested in understanding how people navigate the complexities of conversation. She is especially interested in how we think about and (mis)understand the minds of others in conversation and how we can optimize these interactions to get the most out of our relationships. In another line of research, she is interested in understand why so many people fail to take and enjoy their time off from work. Hanne received her B.A. Honors in Psychology from the University of British Columbia in Vancouver, Canada.
M. Yeomans, J. Minson, H. Collins, H. Chen and F. Gino
We examine “conversational receptiveness”—the use of language to communicate one’s willingness to thoughtfully engage with opposing views. We develop an interpretable machine-learning algorithm to identify the linguistic profile of receptiveness (Studies 1A-B). We then show that in contentious policy discussions, government executives who were rated as more receptive—according to our algorithm and their partners but not their own self-evaluations—were considered better teammates, advisors, and workplace representatives (Study 2). Furthermore, using field data from a setting where conflict management is endemic to productivity, we show that conversational receptiveness at the beginning of a conversation forestalls conflict escalation at the end. Specifically, Wikipedia editors who write more receptive posts are less prone to receiving personal attacks from disagreeing editors (Study 3). We develop a “receptiveness recipe” intervention based on our algorithm. We find that writers who follow the recipe are seen as more desirable partners for future collaboration and their messages are seen as more persuasive (Study 4). Overall, we find that conversational receptiveness is reliably measurable, has meaningful relational consequences, and can be substantially improved using our intervention.
Marlise Hofer, Hanne Collins, Ashley V. Whillans and Frances Chen
The scent of another person can activate memories, trigger emotions, and spark romantic attraction; however, almost nothing is known about whether and how human scents influence responses to stress. In the current study, 96 women were randomly assigned to smell one of three scents (their romantic partner’s, a stranger’s, or a neutral scent) and exposed to an acute stressor (Trier Social Stress Test). Perceived stress and cortisol were measured continuously throughout the study (5 & 7 times, respectively). Perceived stress was reduced in women who were exposed to their partner’s scent. This reduction was observed during stress anticipation and stress recovery. Cortisol levels were elevated in women who were exposed to a stranger’s scent. This elevation was observed throughout stress anticipation, peak stress, and stress recovery. The current work speaks to the critical role of human olfactory cues in social communication and reveals that social scents can impact both psychological and physiological reactions to stress.
